Category: Lit/Pub

Black History Month in 2023

“Black history is American history.”

There is more than one way to read (or use) that phrase. On its face, it affirms that no honest or thorough narrative about the United States can possibly exclude the Black story. But from there, one might say, as Morgan Freeman suggested in a 2005 interview with Mike Wallace, that to distinguish or compartmentalize Black history as a subject can also perpetuate racial divisions and tensions. Thus, the statement is paradoxical, pitting the moral or intellectual obligation to engage with the uniqueness of the Black experience against the idealism of a color-blind society.

Of course, we are not a color-blind society in the ways we should be (i.e., the playing field is not level), but even if that ambition were achieved, it is a fallacy to think that color blindness as a matter of justice is synonymous with colorlessness in cultural or intellectual pursuits. As I have said many times, I defend copyright rights because, in principle, they empower the individual to express herself as she chooses and then empower the public to make of that expression what it will. And the result is a diversity of works.

Despite critics’ implications to the contrary, copyright rights fundamentally reject state authority to approve or deny the production of creative works—a critical distinction between American copyright law and its common law antecedents in England.[1] Sadly, however, neither copyright nor the First Amendment can entirely prevent state actors from engaging in censorship through other legal mechanisms, which brings us to a more cunning use of that phrase, as when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis proclaimed to the TV press that “Black history is American history” in defense of his opposition to part of the curriculum in the African American AP Course.

As the putative leader of a culture war determined to make enemies of neighbors, DeSantis and his ilk exploit the opportunity to tell as many Americans who will listen that to confront (or even hear) certain aspects of the Black story is inherently divisive and tantamount to insisting that White Americans should feel a sense of self-loathing. One cannot deny that there are individuals (Black and White) willing to add fuel to that fire or that there is both good and bad scholarship on every topic, including Black history. But these nuanced distinctions are not what DeSantis’s “anti-woke” political tactic is about, and neither could it be.

It is not possible or appropriate for elected officials to concern themselves with every citizen’s social conduct or every teacher/student engagement or to attempt ad hoc review of every scrap of cultural and academic material. Nobody in DeSantis’s Back to Sleep party has the time, let alone the intelligence, to judge the qualities of every book, essay, or curriculum it hopes to mute because the subject matter threatens the colorless myth of American exceptionalism.

In 1965, when James Baldwin famously debated William F. Buckley, Jr. at Cambridge University, the topic presented was “The American Dream is at the expense of the American Negro.” Baldwin received a standing ovation and won the debate 540 votes to 160. But did Buckley swoon like so many of today’s featherweight conservatives and declare the question itself off limits—too offensive to American idealism to confront? Or when he referred in that debate to Baldwin’s essay The Fire Next Time, can we safely assume that Buckley had read the book rather than make a cowardly proposal to ban it?

Nearly sixty years since that historic joust and almost thirty years after the so-called information revolution, and the progress (to which Buckley alluded in his rebuttal) is a mixed report nationally and a catastrophe in some regions. Columnist Stephanie Hayes, writing for The Tampa Bay Times, remarks on the maturity and deftness of high school students in Pinellas County who last week petitioned their school board to reverse its ban of The Bluest Eye, the first novel written by Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison. Kudos to the students, but seriously?

It is hard not to indulge in gallows humor when a novel published in 1970 is swept into a pathetic, rhetorical war against “wokeness” in 2023. Is there a Woke section in the library or bookstore? Not unless the curator of either is being ironic. Is “woke” the latest reason to shun Baldwin’s 1963 novel Giovanni’s Room? Or what about John Irving’s In One Person in which the protagonist’s coming of age as a homosexual is intertwined with literary discovery and, therefore, confronts Giovanni’s Room through that character’s experience? Is the dialog between Baldwin in 1963 and Irving in 2012 a prime example of “wokeness,” or is it just American literature?

Or, finally, returning to the phrase with which I started this post, is the uniqueness of Baldwin’s experience, in contrast to Irving’s, a reason to celebrate Black History Month? I think so. Not because it is popular to think so, but because although it is true that Black history is American history, it is a subtle but important distinction to say that it is also Black American history. And that story is so complex and distinctive in the world that it is little wonder there are so many extraordinary Black American authors of extraordinary works.

[1] Copyright critics like to point to the fact that proto-copyright regimes in England were intertwined with first the royal prerogative and then then the government’s authority to license the production of certain works, but the U.S. did not retain the power of censorship in even its earliest copyright laws.

James Baldwin photo: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Carl Van Vechten Collection, [reproduction number, e.g., LC-USZ62-54231]

An Open Letter from a Copyright Nerd to About 300 Authors

Dear Authors (“the undersigned”):

It’s not your fault. You mean well. But you are simply wrong to have signed that letter—the one written and orchestrated by Fight for the Future (FFTF), which misrepresents the case Hachette et al., v Internet Archive as an attack on libraries. If I were not a copyright nerd, and I were told that this lawsuit seeks to undermine “traditional library rights,” I probably would have signed that letter, if asked. But the parties calling this a case about library survival are exploiting your good nature and the likelihood that you do not know much about this case. In fact, Authors Guild, in its response this morning states:

“In speaking with authors who signed this letter because they support public libraries, as we do we [sic], they feel misled about the purpose of this letter. For instance, Daniel Handler (Lemony Snicket) disavows the letter and supports the lawsuit.”

The reason I advocate copyright rights is simple enough. I love the arts and firmly believe that a democracy without empowered authors and artists is doomed to become something other than a democracy. As I have been a copyright advocate (and nerd) for just over a decade, I don’t think it would be arrogance at this point to say that I am one of a handful of non-attorney experts on the subject. Not only does my experience encompass a solid knowledge of statutory law, case law, and the history of core doctrines, but it includes many encounters with the tactics of those organizations and individuals who want to strip authors of their copyright rights while disguising that agenda in the rhetoric of democracy, liberty, and defense of the underdog. Internet Archive and Fight for the Future are two organizations baptized in that ideology, and its leaders and comms teams do not scruple to employ tactics indistinguishable from other bullies and liars.

For instance, are you “the undersigned” aware that FFTF engaged in author-shaming on social media? They tagged writers and asked them baseless, rhetorical questions about “helping to sue IA” and whether they really want to keep their books away from “families who can’t afford them.” Surely, you are all keen enough observers of human nature to know that merely tagging authors with such false implications is enough to foster threats—at least one author has received death threats—against some of them. I fail to see how such tactics by FFTF are any more ethical than the kind of ratfucking employed by Trump’s cult to intimidate poll workers, et al. But this is a travesty of the digital age—it is just so damn easy to lie about basic facts in an effort to win an argument in the court of public opinion that one is likely to lose in a court of law.

We have all watched as allegations about “stolen elections” and other staggering bullshit move frictionless at lightspeed through the Twitterverse. But we also breathe a little sigh of relief to see that at least in court, facts must be presented and weighed. And there is a reason why the facts presented in the case against Internet Archive have no resemblance to the allegations made in that letter you signed.

Although Internet Archive has provided us with some wonderful services—I have used its legal archive for research many times—the factual basis for the publishers’ lawsuit is that IA also operates a book scanning and distribution enterprise in a manner that is not allowed by copyright law and which looks nothing like the operation of your library or mine. The specific conduct that predicated the suit was IA’s so-called “National Emergency Library” in March 2020. Citing COVID shutdowns as an excuse, Internet Archive digitally distributed approximately 1.4 million in-copyright books without restriction of any kind—let alone any logic to the titles released, given its stated intent to “help students.”

So, in the simplest terms, no. This is not what libraries do. Real libraries operate within the boundaries of copyright law, which includes several statutory carve-outs written exclusively for those institutions. By contrast, IA asserts theories that are a) unfounded in law; and 2) have been described by Kahle and others as a prelude to changing copyright law in ways that would weaken authors’ rights–and even harm libraries. They have stated, for example, that they see this fight with the publishers as a step toward amending Section 109 of the Copyright Act (first sale doctrine), which is so shortsighted that it would actually dilute the value of real libraries over time. Those of us familiar with Kahle’s agenda recognized the “National Emergency Library” as a stunt—one which may have been intended to provoke the lawsuit now at hand.

It is Mr. Kahle’s consistently stated assertion that copyright rights are little more than a barrier standing between you and your readers. He and his ideological siblings at FFTF, EFF, et al. sincerely and consistently argue that your legal authority to negotiate terms for your labor and talent stands in the way of the public’s access to information and culture. And in the most basic terms, the implications of IA’s conduct—if the publishers were to let it go, or if the court allowed it—would be to substantially undermine the foundation of the only labor right you have as an author. If you believe Mr. Kahle is correct—that the world would work better without those rights—then your signature belongs on that letter. But speaking as a copyright nerd, I assure you that history rejects this view.

During most of the nineteenth century, American publishers hardly invested in American authors for one simple reason:  because the absence of international copyright treaties meant that it was cheaper to reproduce unlicensed copies of European books than it was to publish, and therefore pay, an American author. This is why Walt Whitman advocated for the formal recognition of international copyrights throughout his career, barely living long enough to see the first such American law pass in 1891. Ideologues like Mr. Kahle and his friends talk about a future in which all creative works are unfettered by copyright, but what they don’t mention (or perhaps don’t know) is that we’ve been there, done that. And it sucked.

Another observation I hope I can offer without conceit or offense is that after ten years, I would say that not even the most rights-sensitive authors tend to know a great deal about the particulars of copyright law. And why would you? It’s tedious arcana for attorneys and agents. But this is also why it is dismaying to see names like Neil Gaiman among “the undersigned” while his books and characters are so prominently adapted into motion picture projects and merchandise worth millions.

Because I want to ask whether you are aware, Neil, that the only reason you must be consulted or compensated for those adaptations in the U.S. is Section 106(2) of the Copyright Act? Or that this “right to prepare derivative works” has its origins in a 1907 lawsuit involving the first film adaptation of Ben Hur? Or that the authors’ right to be paid a higher percentage on sales of ebooks than physical books is predicated on this same part of the statute?

So, what I’m saying is that copyright is complicated; you “the undersigned” all benefit from it; authors less prominent than you really depend on it; and you just endorsed the people whose stated agenda is to trash it in ways you probably don’t understand. This is so not about libraries.

Author Bynum Petitions SCOTUS for Remedy to State Copyright Infringement

I have written extensively about state sovereign immunity (a.k.a.,11th Amendment immunity) as it relates to copyright owners’ inability to hold states and state actors liable for recklessly and knowingly infringing protected works. State immunity for violations of federal statutes against persons is a maddening subject—rife with judicial and historical contradictions and implications that reach far beyond intellectual property. Among the many infuriating aspects of the immunity story is that, in theory, persons injured by state violations of their federal rights can pursue “other remedies” when they are barred from suit in federal court. In theory. But not in Texas.

Texas does not equivocate: it rejects any remedy for victims whose intellectual property is blatantly stolen—which even Texas cannot deny happened here.

That statement comes from sports author Mike Bynum’s petition for certiorari to the Supreme Court in response to Texas’s and the Fifth Circuit’s hard-to-follow rationales for denying Bynum any remedy whatsoever for the undisputed theft of his intellectual property. Specifically, Bynum was working on a book about the legendary “Dixie Classic” football game of 1922, during which the “12th Man,” E. King Gill who, though not a member of the team, suited up ready to play because so many members of the Aggie squad had been injured that day.

In my post published at this time last year, I detailed the facts of Bynum’s complaint and the Fifth Circuit’s ruling. In summary, parties at the university’s athletic department copied and distributed Bynum’s unpublished manuscript, removing his name and copyright notice in the process. The material was ultimately distributed to an estimated 350,000 readers—the same audience that would have been interested in buying the book.

With a built-in fanbase and potential long tail interest in the work, the financial damage to Bynum is arguably substantial—but at any valuation, it was surely total. While most piracies cause at least some harm to the copyright owner, TAMU’s wholesale destruction of Bynum’s first publication opportunity effectively killed all financial interest in the author’s work-in-progress.

If that sounds like an illegal “taking” by the state, that’s what Bynum and others think, too—especially when they are barred by sovereign immunity from enforcing their statutory copyright rights. In fact, takings, unfair competition, torts, etc. have long been speculated as alternative remedies in the debate about sovereign immunity. Even the Supreme Court, in affirming that Congress’s Article I powers were insufficient on their own to abrogate state immunity, argued that the possibility of state remedies had “barely been considered,” by Congress.[1] And, as noted in that post last year, the Court, in filmmaker Rick Allen’s case against North Carolina (Allen v. Cooper) indicated that a copyright owner may sue a state entity in federal court “if he can demonstrate a constitutional violation and show that there is no remedy available in state court—which together would rise to a violation of due process.”

But as Bynum’s petition describes, the Fifth Circuit decided that 1) copyright infringement is never a taking because copyright rights are not property; 2) that his due process claim is barred on the grounds that the state could hypothetically provide an avenue for state remedy at some point in the future; and 3) that takings claims are altogether barred by sovereign immunity despite the fact that the Supreme Court has held that the Takings clause requires some compensatory remedy in federal court.

The case law underlying these matters is expansive and, as stated above, tangled in contradictory opinions dating back to the ratification of the Constitution. Every time I return to the subject, I feel like I’m starting over, and I will do readers the favor of not attempting to unravel every nuance in a single post. I suspect the Court will grant cert here because of the constitutional questions presented; because circuit splits are argued; and because of the states’ rights implications.

But one aspect I hope the Court will emphasize in Bynum’s case is the thoroughness with which TAMU took the whole value of his property interest in the manuscript—and even went so far as to remove evidence of his authorship and copyright claim, which is reckless as well as illegal. As the petition cites, the Court in Allen v. Cooper held that “copyrights ‘are a form of property” under the Fourteenth Amendment and that an ‘intentional, or at least reckless’ copyright violation may violate due process rights.”

The holistic nature of the state theft in Bynum may be instructive to the extent that photographer Jim Olive’s case against the University of Houston is otherwise held to inform these considerations. Olive sued the University of Houston for infringement of his aerial photograph, but the Texas Supreme Court held that the complaint was not ripe for a per se Takings claim on the basis that the university had not fully deprived the photographer of his right to exploit his copyright rights in the image in other contexts.

Even if that theory has merit as a Takings consideration (because it is no way to look at copyright), the Supreme Court in Bynum should carefully consider the contrast of that reasoning against the utter destruction to Bynum’s property interest in his book. “TAMU’s copyright violation was flagrant, damaging, and largely undisputed. Texas’s legal position—and the Fifth Circuit’s—is that states simply can steal copyrighted material with impunity. As state copyright violations continue to proliferate nationwide, that warrants this Court’s intervention,” the petition argues.

Indeed it does.

[1] Florida Prepaid v. College Savings (Rehnquist, 1999)

Photo by: Angelstorm